Even The Most Zealous Witch
by Impossible Cauldronite
Summary: ...makes mistakes? Constance and Imogen irritate the life out of each other, but everyone makes mistakes sometimes, right? (*bad summary alert*) T for now, but some possibly quite dark moments later...yes there's some femslash, reviews will be loved more that I love cake, but don't be too mean, I'm not used to writing this type of story! :)
1. Chapter 1

Her eyes flickered fleetingly to the side, deliberately catching a glimpse of her own reflection despite being certain that she knew there would not be a single stray hair. She was not vain, though, she glanced into her mirror only once in the morning, simply because she was not arrogant enough to make an assumption without evidence, and she knew that she had to be purely flawless. She was a witch for whom there are no whites or blacks, no blues or reds, only golds. Only perfection.

Closing the cupboard door and tucking away the mirror, she turned back to the sleeping figure curled under her blankets. She gazed longingly for a moment, silently admiring the forbidden creature before harshly nudging her awake.

"Whass goin' on?" muttered the sleepy non-witch, without opening her eyes.

"You need to get up," Constance replied quietly, but with a touch of urgency in her voice.

Imogen groaned as she leant across to see the clock.

"Const-," she yawned, "It's too early, it's barely even light out there yet!"

Constance stared blankly at her, perhaps confused by her concept of 'earliness'.

Imogen sighed heavily as she sat up and her fleece was thrown across the room and landed on her lap.

"How do we end up like this?" she asked quietly, avoiding her lover's gaze, "Would it be so bad for you to just lie here with me for a while?"

Constance looked hurt. She was always caught up in the eternal battle between the things she wanted, the things she_ thought_ she wanted, and the things she thought she _should _want.

"Imogen, I-"

It didn't matter that she didn't know what to say; she realised that Imogen would be upset with her anyway.

"What? Can't?" Imogen snapped, pulling on her sock and standing up, "Seriously, Constance, I don't understand you, sometimes you – you're just so unaffectionate!"

"That's not true and you know it," Constance said quietly, sounding defensive despite feeling Imogen's sharp words etching themselves into her chest, "Unless I've been imagining things which-"

"Oh, you'd like that, wouldn't you?" said Imogen rather loudly, and perhaps more spitefully than she had intended, "Then everything would be exactly as you want it!"

"Shh!" Constance anxiously shushed her.

Imogen glared angrily.

"I don't mean to upset you," Constance whispered, reaching for Imogen's hand, "I'm just not very good at this kind of thing...and if anyone..."

Imogen snatched her hand away, but being unable to stay angry with the adorably annoying witch for long, changed her mind and wrapped her arms around Constance's waist, looking up into her eyes.

"It doesn't matter what anyone else would think," she whispered earnestly, "Things _could _be really good between us, you know!"

Constance was thrown by the sudden change in temperament, but content in their moment of closeness, she leaned in for a kiss. Imogen allowed her just one little peck before backing away.

"No more waking me up ridiculously early," she warned her, showing a slight cheeky smile, "See you at breakfast..."

Constance felt abandoned as her lover grinned and walked away from her. The unfathomable feelings tangling themselves amongst her magic turned to anger, merely because the magic sensed that rage seemed to feel less pathetic than sadness and uncertainty. Constance sighed, knowing that the baffling negative emotions had likely surfaced in retaliation of the happiness she had allowed herself to feel in the precious hours previously. Either way, she didn't like it.

She stared with intent at the bottle of deep blue liquid that had been hiding in her desk drawer.

_Misery and confusion are not voluntary. But escaping from them is..._


	2. Chapter 2

As she had grown accustomed to occasionally doing, Constance had taken a few small sips of her secret blue potion, and she felt much better now that her thoughts were not so clouded by nonsensical emotions. She swept tenaciously across her room, routinely picking up her emerald cloak and herb-picking basket.

Never had there been a day when Constance would do this differently. Every early morning was the same, because that was the only way it made any sense. _Why change a way of doing things when it is not ineffective? _Only this morning, she had made more than just the one unusual move she occasionally allowed to pass unquestioned. An extra bottle clinked against the wide-awake potion stowed at the bottom of her bag as she walked purposefully down the corridor, the only interruption of her over-logical string of thoughts.

That was at least until she passed the bathroom and heard a very different sound.

She often heard Imogen singing in the mornings, but this did not make the occurrence any less uncomfortable. It never made sense to Constance, for it was always some tune that she didn't know, some lyrics with careless grammar, prattling on about melting body parts which couldn't be melted, or travelling darkness and uncooked electricity or being on your knees trying to locate air.

She shrugged slightly as she began to pace through the woods, knowing exactly where to find the best potion-making ingredients, and being somewhat glad that this was not one of those mornings when she had a group of complaining students trailing lazily behind her.

* * *

Imogen always wore a shining smile, it seemed. Or perhaps it was just the response she chose for Constance entering the room. Constance thought about it, but she didn't really know. If she was honest, truly honest, there were far too many little things that she didn't know. Perhaps they were the unimportant things, she thought, or perhaps they were things that were too important. She didn't know that either.

Brought back from her thoughts by laughter, she had clearly missed another joke. Imogen caught her gaze across the table, but Constance soon looked away.

Over time, Constance had convinced herself, and possibly anyone else that happened to be in the vicinity, that it was Imogen that was the outsider among the staff at Cackle's Academy. But as she sipped her unusually bitter tea, she questioned the validity of that conviction.

Sometimes, she thought, she simply did not understand other people.

_It hits me like a clawing flock of bats, each carrying a trace of truth..._


	3. Chapter 3

It was nearing the Christmas holidays, and it had become increasingly difficult for Imogen to motivate the girls to do any exercise whatsoever in the damp, foggy weather which had enveloped the castle over the past couple of weeks. With a slight drizzle beginning to pour outside this morning, however, she had persuaded Miss Cackle to allow her the use of the great hall to play basketball instead – something that she had been fairly sure that a certain someone would not be impressed by...

"Were you responsible for that ball-bouncing cacophony that has been punctuating the delicate silence of my potions class for the last hour?"

Imogen never failed to be startled by Constance's sudden appearance beside her. And _how_ did Constance always seem to correctly guess where she was standing, anyway?

"Miss Hardbroom," she breathed, "I – I'm sorry, you know the girls need their exercise!"

Constance pursed her lips in annoyance. She did not value exercise like Imogen did – just as Imogen did not value magic to the extent that Constance did.

"Potions requires concentration, Miss Drill, and concentration, by its very nature, requires qu-"

"If you need it quiet, couldn't you just – cast a sound-proofing spell or something?"

"I most certainly could not!"

"Why not? You've done it before, haven't you?"

Constance moved and glared out of the window for a moment, unsure of her response and thoroughly regretting the level of knowledge Imogen seemed to be gaining about her.

"Never mention that again," she whispered in a half-snarl and with a more dangerous glare.

Imogen momentarily shifted her gaze to check their surroundings. Noticing that they were alone, she gently laid a hand on the crook of Constance's arm.

"It's alright," she whispered softly, "No-one's here"

The witch glanced sharply at her as she took a sharp breath, folding her arms tightly again.

"Don't," said Imogen, predicting her next move.

They stayed like that for a while, oddly both comfortable and uncomfortable in the same moment. Imogen pondered over the mysterious creature that was Constance Hardbroom.

"What are you doing over the holidays?" she asked, silently wondering whether she was happy with her own plans to spend Christmas with her non-magical family.

"What do you mean?" Constance said after a somewhat lengthy pause.

"Are you going anywhere? Visiting anyone?"

Constance shuffled her feet slightly and turned away; busying herself with an invisble cat-hair she had somehow plucked from somewhere.

"I have work to do," she said simply.

_ You can treat me like I'm untouchable, but please remember that I'm not._


	4. Chapter 4

Even the library was not quiet enough. The noise seemed to have been stalking her all day, gradually increasing in volume and becoming more and more intolerable. She somehow snagged both her hip and her knuckle on the corner of the table; gasping sharply as the pain she felt was disproportionate to what had just happened. She held the knuckle to her lips, only just noticing the incredibly foul taste that had brewed in her mouth.

Looking around, the untidiness of the room was becoming increasingly irritating, despite the fact that she was slowly putting things away. Without using magic, she knew that the task would take longer than usual, but even then it seemed too arduous. She felt – odd – fuzzy, perhaps. She couldn't place an exact word that could accurately describe it.

The whole room lurched as she doubled over in a second round of agony, desperately willing herself not to be violently sick on that already terribly-patterned rug which covered the trap-door. She had a vague idea what might be happening to her. But _how?_ And more importantly – _who?_

Her hands tingled unbearably. Only now did she notice how far from her fingertips it had spread. She wondered whether she dared to risk using magic to help herself. But even if she did, she knew that this was not something that a simple spell would fix.

She set a potion bottle on the edge of the table, wondering whether that could be of any help now. But she didn't have the strength to lift it again to try.

* * *

"Throwing food _again!"_ Miss Cackle muttered, shaking her head, "When will those girls ever stop this nonsense?"

"I know what you mean, Miss Cackle," replied Miss Drill, brushing a gravy splatter from her sleeve, "It seems like only Miss Hardbroom who can make those two get along!"

"Where is Miss Hardbroom, anyway?" Miss Cackle said, looking around as if the witch would appear in response to her name.

"How should I know?" Miss Drill replied, almost too quickly.

* * *

She had wisely decided against using the potion again. Breathing heavily, she stumbled to the shelf she needed. Not that she didn't know the spells word for word – she just had a feeling that someone else might _not_ know the right spells; they would never have had to know them.

Reaching out to the book, and hoping beyond anything that her double vision wouldn't make her grab the wrong one, she stumbled again. The book fell as everything else swayed and her knees collided forcefully with the hard floor, a pain not eased at all by that dratted thin rug.

Suddenly the lyrics to one of Imogen's ridiculous tunes suddenly became all too relevant. She couldn't breathe. It really was as though someone had extracted every last molecule of air from the spinning world.

_And I never see the sudden curve 'til it's way too late..._


	5. Chapter 5

_**AN: **__Firstly, apologies to anyone who got into this story because I haven't updated it for absolutely ages! It's only because this story feels like it works much better in my mind than it looks when I type it out :S_

_Anyway, reviews/comments/smileyfaces very welcome, and I will try much harder to update sooner this time, but for now, I have to sleep...early lectures are like my own personal Broomhead these days..._

* * *

Imogen gave a grumpy sigh as she wiped the last of the tables; the clearing up duty had unfairly fallen to her again as Constance had still not appeared. Through her irritation, though, she could not help but wonder where the deputy headmistress had disappeared to. She tossed the cloth back into the cleaning bucket as she saw Miss Cackle pass the door, and wondered whether she should ask. Constance Hardbroom was not one to tell everyone everything, but _surely_ her superior would know where she had mysteriously gone...and why.

"Miss Cac-" she began, before being interrupted by a much louder yell from the top of the stairs.

"MISS CACKLE!" came the shrill, usually-much-more-calm, voice of Lavinia Crotchet, "Amelia! Library, come quickly!"

"What on earth's the matter, Lavinia?" Amelia said, looking startled as she retraced her steps back to the stairs.

Imogen followed her to the library too, mainly out of curiosity, but also because she could keep up with Lavinia's running much easier than Amelia could.

* * *

"Constance!" Imogen shrieked, rushing straight to her witch's side.

But Constance didn't respond.

Imogen fought back tears as she looked back to her shocked colleagues.

"What's wrong with her?" she asked, a desperate pleading evident in her eyes.

"Oh my goodness," Amelia panted, kneeling down by her deputy's other side and helping Imogen to turn her onto her side, "Constance, my girl, can you hear me?"

"Can't you – do a spell or something?" said Imogen, now sounding even more worried than before.

"Imogen, magic isn't _that_ magical! You can't just do a random spell without knowing what you're trying to do!" Amelia snapped, somewhat uncharacteristically.

"There must be somethi-"

"Wait, look at this," Lavinia interrupted, reaching out to retrieve a piece of broken glass from beneath the table, "What is it?"

"_How the hell_ are you more interested in that than-"

"Imogen!" Amelia silenced her, "It looks like a piece of a potion bottle, let me see,"

She inspected the pieces of glass, but found no label. In a desperate attempt to find any clue that could help the potions mistress, she reached for her bag.

"Wide-awake potion," she stated, producing another bottle, this time with a label, "That wouldn't do anything bad on its own...but there's another one of these unlabeled ones. _How are we supposed to know what they are?"_

"Is there any left?" asked Lavinia, suddenly struck with an idea.

"It's very almost empty," Amelia replied, "Not enough time to analyse it though"

"Why don't I try drinking it?" the non-witch suggested, "Then you can see what it does?"

"No, Imogen," said Amelia, "It's obviously dangerous,"

"But we've got to help Constance!"

"What if I do it?" Lavinia volunteered quietly.

"No," Imogen argued, "You two are witches; you need to be able to sort this – whatever it is – out. I'm not a witch; this is the only thing I can do that might be useful!"

She took the bottle and drained its contents. It was not even enough to be a mouthful.

"Well?" whispered Amelia, "How do you feel?"

"Perfectly fine," said Imogen, despite sounding a little bit less like her usual self, "However, I do believe that you ought to focus your attention on Constance,"

Imogen paused for a moment, feeling that the words were not hers, and although the meaning was still the same, she no longer felt afraid. In fact, she no longer felt anything.

_Chaos is no longer more likely than order_

_Emotions will no longer surround this border_

_For I am the master of clear mentality_

_With a certain poisoned rationality._


	6. Chapter 6

**_AN: _**_Oh dear. Well. I've been so crazy/busy lately that even I haven't seen this fic in about seven weeks. It doesn't even seem to want to live in my 'recent documents' folder anymore, that's how bad it is!_

_Anyway, I'm still not 100% sure how well I'm doing with this story, like I said before one of the other chapters, it seemed better in my imagination than it does on the screen :/_

_So, yeah, just a little chapter for now, pleeease let me know what your thoughts are, I have a little bit of a plan for the next chapter too..._

* * *

"I'm perfectly alright having taken that, and, as far as I am aware, Constance has taken wide-awake potion before with no adverse effects. The available evidence suggests that it is the mixture of the two which has caused this," Imogen gestured towards Constance, and took a deep breath, "And I'm under the impression that this is a rational-thinking potion of some description"

The headmistress stared seriously at each of her colleagues, making sense of their unusual situation.

"There is such a thing," she muttered, "But it's incredibly difficult to make,"

"Not such a problem for our potions mistress, I'd think," Lavinia chipped in, looking concerned.

"She must have known how dangerous these are!" Amelia burst out in her frustration, "I – I don't –"

"I believe that we've missed something, Miss Cackle," Imogen interrupted, her gaze settling on an old-looking book that appeared to have fallen from a shelf and now lay face-down but open, not far from the potions mistress's hand. "What's that?"

Lavinia picked up the book and examined the page it had landed on.

"Looks like a spell," she confirmed, "But I don't recognise it...I don't think it's one that I've ever used,"

She passed the book to Amelia, who examined it more closely.

"Definitely not a common spell," she mused, "It doesn't say anything else, though...I don't know what this is!"

She flipped the book over again, hoping that its title would at least guide her to what kind of magic it contained. But there was nothing there to read. Nor was there anything visible on any of the neighbouring pages she quickly flicked through. She looked up again.

"What do you think?" asked Lavinia quietly.

"Try it, perhaps?" Imogen suggested.

"We don't know what it is though," Amelia reasoned, "Anything could happen!"

"I don't think it's a coincidence," said Imogen.

There was a pause. Imogen wondered if she, not having an extensive knowledge of any kind of magic, had spoken out of turn. But the effect of the potion was wearing off and she was beginning to feel strong concern for Constance again, and was desperate for something to happen to try to help the witch.

"Neither do I," whispered Amelia, "Constance is too clever, she must have known something..."

She glanced back to the page, somehow instinctively knowing that the spell was designed to be non-verbal. It was more about having the right feeling...

_Trusting instincts,buried clues intertwined, Onwards we strive 'til the answers we find_


	7. Chapter 7

**_AN: Procrastination for the nation indeed._**

**_The to-do pile on my desk is unbelievably large BUT at least we have another chapter, so all is (or should be) well with the world for a while..._**

**_Mucho loveso!_**

* * *

Amelia noticed that the words printed across the page of the anonymous spell book disappeared the second that the magic left her fingers. She immediately wished that she had thought to memorise the words, but she hadn't. She looked around at her colleagues, partly hoping for some insight, something that perhaps she had missed in her fear.

What seemed like an eternity passed in the space of mere seconds before the glum silence was interrupted by a barely audible sniff.

Each of them sensed that they knew who had made the sound, but were equally unsure about whether or not they dared to believe it was a good sign.

_Had the spell worked?_

Imogen desperately wanted an answer, but couldn't even bring herself to voice the question. By this time her concern for Constance had returned, fully-fledged feelings of fear consumed her entire mind once again. The effects of the unknown potion had well and truly worn off.

The three of them braved the slightest of relief-driven smiles when their potions mistress feebly flexed her spell casting fingers.

"Do you think we should move her somewhere a bit more comfortable?" Lavinia asked rather quietly.

Amelia nodded, now gripping Constance's hand tightly.

"Is she – " Imogen struggled to say what she wanted to, "Will she be alright?"

"I hope so," Amelia sighed, "Lavinia, give me a hand here, please"

In silence, Lavinia reached for Constance's other hand, and with that, the three of them disappeared, leaving Imogen kneeling alone on the hideous library rug.

"I'll just walk there then, shall I?"

* * *

When Imogen caught up with the others, Amelia was tucking Constance up in her blankets. Imogen thought that she really did look like a mother tending to her sick child. Lavinia was standing by the window, trying to get a candle to stand up in a lantern. For some reason she hadn't thought to use magic to make that task easier.

Imogen made a spot for herself to sit on the floor, not too far away from Constance, but not too close that it would be suspicious. Doing so, she also shoved a particularly bright green sock further under the bed with her foot. Not that any of this mattered to her at the moment, but she thought that it would matter to Constance, and that was important to her.

"You don't think she meant to do this, do you?" Lavinia said in a barely audible whisper, not knowing whether she could even cope with what the answer might be.

An uncomfortable, heavy silence hung between them. It was a thought that had crossed everyone's mind, but one that no one had wanted to believe.

"Imogen," Amelia broke the silence eventually, "I know that the two of you seem to have got closer lately..."

"What do you mean by that?" Imogen said, surprised by the headmistress's apparent perceptiveness.

"Well, you just seem to be talking more and sniping at each other less...I was about to ask whether you had noticed anything unusual recently?"

Imogen shrugged, too shocked by all of this to be able to phrase a reply.

How on earth had it fallen to her to be the one that might have noticed something? And besides, what _isn't_ unusual about Constance Hardbroom? Maybe that was it; maybe they all misunderstood her and her feelings. What if there was a dark sadness buried under that mask of strangeness and perfectionism? But who ever bothered to even look? Amelia had too many responsibilities to the students...Students that thought HB was far too mean to have any real feelings...then Lavinia was continuously caught up in her music or her dancing or her...horoscopes...and Imogen... She had felt at times that she was perhaps the closest person Constance had in her life, but even now she felt miles away.

The lump in her throat was too much and she could not restrain the tears anymore. She almost wished that she _had _noticed something unusual. She wished that Constance had been able to tell her how she truly felt...and more than anything else she wished that she had told Constance, once and a million times, how _she _truly felt about_ her_.

_I see time go by far too fast, and what of this is in the past?_

_Hope this isn't where you want to be, 'cos you mean more than that to me..._


	8. Chapter 8

**_AN: _**_Just a little chapter! May have side-tracked slightly from my original ideas, so please do let me know what your thoughts are!_

* * *

They had decided to take shifts in sitting with the still-sleeping potions mistress. Someone would have to check that the girls were all safe and in bed, after all.

Imogen agreed to take the first shift, mostly out of a desire to not leave Constance's side. Before leaving, Amelia had assured her that she would be alright, and that she just needed to sleep off the incredible amount of magic that would likely be running through her veins.

Hoping beyond anything that she wouldn't have to wait too long for her to wake, even if it were for just a few seconds, Imogen perched beside her unconscious witch. Eventually she felt safe enough to take those pale hands in her own and whisper words of comfort.

"I do care about you, Constance Hardbroom," she said softly, stroking a piece of stray hair gently back into its rightful place, "I love you so much"

With that she planted a tender kiss upon her lover's lips, not noticing a momentary presence behind her.

* * *

Amelia stood in the corridor in shock for several long moments after what was quite possibly the quickest retreat she had ever made.

_"What on earth was that?"_she thought to herself, her hand shaking slightly as she placed the tea, meant for Imogen, on the floor beside the door she had just silently closed.

Of all the unexpected possibilities, this was the second unexpected event in one evening!

She didn't know whether to take a deep breath and interrupt, or to take a different kind of deep breath and just walk away. Imogen couldn't possibly be any real danger to Constance, could she? Was it possible that the young non-witch had developed some kind of infatuation with her deputy? Of course, Constance would never stand for something like that, even if she was unconscious. And whatever her current condition, she surely had enough magic within her to defend against any...unwanted advances of that nature. Yet it seemed even less plausible that the relationship between the two usually-bickering colleagues had ever become something more than that.

She decided to leave it for the time being – she wouldn't have the faintest idea what to say to Imogen anyway. Never had she ever had to deal with anything quite like this before.

Walking back towards her office, she met Lavinia going in the opposite direction.

"I wondered where you'd got to," Lavinia said, turning around to join her, "The girls are all fine, everyone's in bed"

But Amelia's thoughts could not be collected by that information.

_Thank you for telling me that there's nothing to tell me,_

_I mean, maybe they aren't, but they are_


	9. Chapter 9

**_AN_**_: I think I'll be eternally apologetic for the stupid amount of time it is taking me to write this story! What it really comes down to though, is reality interfering with my magical muses!_

_Anyway, here we are; a very mini chapter! :-)_

* * *

"Wha's going on?"

Amelia awoke from her state of semi-doze, not quite startled, but sure that she had heard somebody speak. She didn't think that she had slept but the small candle that she had placed on Constance's desk appeared to have burnt out. Searching for another candle, she squinted through the darkness, just being able to make out a slight movement of the outline of her deputy.

"Imogen?" she spoke again, perhaps even more quietly than before, "What're you doing?"

Amelia froze, wondering whether the best response would be to reveal herself, or quietly go and fetch the non-witch she had earlier sent to get some sleep. She realised that in her haste she had forgotten to ask whether Constance had woken, or spoken in her absence. Perhaps she had, and that was why she expected Imogen to still be there. But surely Imogen would have mentioned that?

"Who's there?" Constance asked, feeling somewhat dazed, and confused that her partner was unresponsive.

"It's me," came the reply, as a new candle was lit, "Amelia,"

"What's going on?" Constance asked again, fidgeting in her blanket and perhaps trying to hide her surprise at the presence of the headmistress, "What time is it?"


	10. Chapter 10

"Try to relax, Constance, everything's going to be alright," Amelia said softly, "You need to take it easy. How do you feel?"

"I – " Constance stammered. Confused would probably have been an appropriate answer. "Sleepy," she said instead, "Too much magic"

"Alright, my dear" Amelia replied, "I think you may have been overloaded with magic. Go back to sleep if you need to."

"How, though?" Constance muttered, laying back into her pillow, "What happened?"

"We don't know. The main thing right now is that you're going to be alright,"

"But – " Constance sighed heavily, not knowing what to say.

"We can talk about it later," Amelia said, "We'll talk about everything when you feel ready to"

But Constance didn't want to talk about everything. She wasn't even sure whether she knew what Amelia meant by 'everything'. She just wanted to know what had happened, and whether there was still danger to worry about. And she wanted to know right now, not at some indeterminable later time.

She could remember waking up with Imogen. She could remember picking herbs, drinking tea, teaching potions. She remembered her talk with Imogen. It had been a relatively ordinary day, with an exception. She had felt increasingly ill as the day wore on.

"I need to know what happened," she said eventually, "Be honest, please, tell me,"

"Constance," Amelia sighed, "I can't say. I don't think I know anything more than you do."

She glanced around in response to a noise outside the door.

Imogen then poked her head around the edge of the door, looking somewhat sleepy herself.

"I thought I heard talking," she said, "Is everything alright?"

Constance smiled slightly on hearing Imogen's soft voice. Although she'd never want to admit it, she was in desperate need of some comfort beyond that which Amelia was attempting to give to her. She knew that Imogen was likely to keep her distance in present company, but her mere presence was somewhat reassuring.

"It's fine, Imogen," Amelia responded, "Constance still needs to rest, but she'll be ok in a while. Do you want to sit here for a while?"

Amelia felt a certain degree of awkwardness but she felt that Constance seemed to have been a little more relaxed since Imogen's appearance, and if that helped her to feel better even in the slightest, then so be it. She was not convinced that she would be particularly happy about this type of relationship, but her desire to keep things calm over-rode that thought.

"I – I think I'll make some tea and breakfast shortly," she invented a reason to give the pair some time together, although it was plausible as it was beginning to become fairly light outside. "Promise me that you'll rest, Constance," she added, perhaps semi-sternly.

Imogen hovered by the door for a moment even after Amelia had left the room. Constance patted the edge of the bed, encouraging Imogen to sit with her. She perched beside her and picked up one of her hands, the frightening thoughts in her mind making her still unsure what to say.

"Give me a hug," Constance whispered softly, and Imogen obliged. Finally they both felt safe in each other's arms. They lay like that for a while before Imogen decided what it was that she wanted to say.

"I love you, Constance," she whispered, still half-burying her face in Constance's shoulder to hide her tearful eyes, "I was so worried about you. I thought – I th-"

"Don't," Constance replied quietly, "I'm alright. Everything's fine."

"You don't have to pretend, Constance," Imogen sniffed, "I'll help you,"

Constance suddenly realised what it was that Imogen had been thinking, and this realisation sparked the recollection of an important detail that had been missing from her memory of the previous day. The potions, the magic, and gradually things made much more sense.

"Imogen," she spoke more firmly now, "I promise you...this wasn't what you think..."

* * *

_Reality can't hit you if you run, but what if you reach the edge of the world?_


End file.
